


Break Before We Fall

by UchiHime



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Character Death, Dubious Consent, Ego Defense Mechanism: Denial, M/M, Mpreg, Suicide Attempt
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-09-21
Updated: 2013-01-14
Packaged: 2017-11-14 17:40:33
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 2
Words: 14,915
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/517833
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/UchiHime/pseuds/UchiHime
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Harry is captured by Voldemort the summer after sixth year and finds himself held prisoner with Draco. When Draco tells them what's in store for them they make a choice.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Sometimes the Choice We Make...

He was hot... no, he was more than hot; he was burning. Fire was running through his veins. Bright, searing, hot fire that set his blood boiling. Red hot flames that melted his flesh from his bones. He was in a furnace. He was on the sun. Part of him knew that he wasn't really on fire, but the heat had fried his brain too much to string together a coherent thought. So hot, this had to be a new form of torture, a blistering torment devised to kill him through spontaneous combustion. Surely the heat was high enough to make his flesh combustible.

But, though the heat was bad, the worst part was the thirst. He was so thirsty! The heat had dried up all the water within him, leaving his throat and mouth as dry as the Sahara Desert. His throat was so dry, it hurt just to breathe. His lips were cracked, but it was too hot to bleed.

And then someone touched him, and if he thought he was feverish before, then he was lying on a beach in Hades now. So much heat came from that little touch of skin against his skin, all he wanted to do was open his mouth and scream, but his throat was too arid for that. He was vaguely aware of someone making soothing noises in his ear, but his brain had short-circuited from the heat a long time ago. Something was being pressed against his lips, and he'd no strength to resist. But, as if the gods were suddenly on his side, it was ice cold water being poured into his mouth and washing the metaphorical sand from his throat. And, even better, an equally wet/cold towel was being pressed against his fevered forehead; making the impossible heat seem just a little bit better.

"Sleep," the soothing voice said, "the heat will be gone soon."

It wasn't as if he had the strength to do anything else, so he allowed himself to be guided into a lying down position and welcomed the relief from the heat offered by unconsciousness.

It was the pain that woke him up.

Sharp pains like knives through his belly. He absently noted that the unbearably heat was gone, but he was more worried about the throbbing pain coming from his lower abdomen. He opened his mouth in a silent scream as his arms wrapped themselves around his stomach to protect against whatever was inflicting the pain... but the pain was internal. His insides were brutally tearing themselves apart. It hurt so much it almost felt numb. The numbness that came from over stimulation of the pain threshold. A numbness that wasn't really numbness at all, but a higher, more acute sense of agony. It was the same as the scream so loud that it was silent. The very same scream pushing itself from his throat now.

What the hell was going on? First the heat, now the pain... what had he done to warrant this punishment?

Hot tears spilled from his eyes and rolled down his cheeks as he tossed and turned, trying to escape the torment that kept following him. "Shh," someone whispered, carding fingers through his hair. "I know it hurts, but it'll be over soon." He whimpered in pain, but couldn't help but finding comfort in the soft voice and gentle touch.

"Hurts," he rasped out.

"I know," the voice said. "I'm so sorry." Fingers continued carding through his hair and more kind words were whispered into his ear. He found that if he focused only on the voice and fingers in his hair, he could almost forget about the pain, almost convince himself it wasn't real. Almost, but not completely, though enough to allow himself to fall back to sleep.

This time he was woken by someone shaking his shoulder and calling his name.

He didn't want to wake; he was more than content to float through this painless unconsciousness that he was resting in now. It seemed so long since anything had been painless. He didn't want to leave the blissful black nothingness that he's finally found after a seeming eternity of searching. But someone was determined to pull him from his hard-found solitude.

"Come on, Potter," the voice said, still shaking his shoulder urgently. "You need to wake up, now. Come on. Wake up!"

Consciousness settled over him like a thick, suffocating blanket. Harry blinked his eyes open slowly, groaning at the light—not overly bright, but an obvious shift from the blackness of sleep—that assaulted his retinas.

"Come on, Potter, wake up!" The voice sounded familiar now and with the sluggish mind of one who has slept too long or not enough, Harry managed to connect the voice with the person he could now see leaning over him. Of course comprehension was even slower arriving, and its arrival made Harry wonder if he was not still sleeping after all. But of course he wasn't still sleeping, because this person wasn't going to allow him to sleep even if said person's presence in Harry's room was an impossibility.

Then again, Harry wasn't in his room, was he? The smallest bedroom of #4 Privet Drive was, obviously, small and did not contain dark wood paneled walls, parquet flooring, with expensively ancient rugs, and a king sized bed donned with dark brown and red bed-covers. And the smallest bedroom of #4 Privet Drive most definitely did not contain a pest known as Draco Malfoy who seemed to have taken on the role of Harry's personal alarm clock. So that only left one question.

"Where am I?"

"Thank Merlin, you're awake." Draco Malfoy was visibly relieved as he sat up and away from Harry.

"Malfoy," Harry said, sitting up in the large bed he'd been sleeping in and looking at his schoolmate in confusion. Harry had been having mixed feelings about the Malfoy heir ever since that night in the Astronomy Tower, when the blond had been about to lower his wand and accept Dumbledore's help. The Draco Malfoy that Harry had seen that night did not correspond at all with the Draco Malfoy that Harry had known since he was eleven. The Malfoy of the past would not have been so torn up about the events of that night, and Harry was partially convinced that the Malfoy of the past only existed in the carefully constructed mask the Malfoy in the Astronomy Tower had been forced to wear.

"Where are we?" Harry asked again.

"In hell," Malfoy stated simply. "Or as close as we'll get to hell while still living. What's the last thing you remember before waking up here?"

Harry thought about it for a second. "I remember being hot and pain, lots of pain."

"In your lower abdomen?" Draco phrased it like a question, but it was evident he already knew it as fact. "That was still here, think back farther than that."

Harry squeezed his eyes closed and focused on retrieving his last memory before the heat and the pain, but still all he could get was little flashes that didn't quite make up a whole picture. "I was shaking my cousin's hand. Then it felt like I was standing in a house of mirrors, surrounded by replicas of me. There was flying with Hagrid. Then Hedwig was dead."

"They were trying to move you to a safe location," Draco offered. "But somehow the information got out. You were ambushed. You were captured."

"Captured?" Harry couldn't quite understand.

"Yes, captured. You're in Malfoy Manor, Potter. You're the Dark Lord's prisoner. We're the Dark Lord's prisoners."

The news set in slowly, but looking around made Harry see the obvious truth it held. He was definitely not on Privet Drive anymore, this room was too large to be a part of the Burrow, and Draco Malfoy would not be allowed in Grimmauld Place. So Malfoy had to be speaking the truth. He was at Malfoy Manor. He was a prisoner. They were prisoners together. This was hell.

"How long?" he asked. Harry wasn't sure he was asking how long he'd been there, or how long it would be until the Dark Lord came for him.

"A week." Harry didn't know which question Draco was answering or if he was answering both.

"Why so long? Why am I not dead already?"

Draco sighed and stood up from the bed. As the blond began to pace around the room, Harry couldn't help but notice how haggard he looked. It look like Draco had slept in the clothes he was wearing, his hair was greasy and messy, his skin was paler than usual, there was bags under his eyes, and he seemed to emit and air of tired desolation and remorse.

"I screwed up," Draco stated, he paced across the parquet floor in front of the bed, while running fingers through his hair. "Last school year, I screwed up. I was supposed to kill Dumbledore, but I failed. The Dark Lord wasn't pleased with me. I thought he was going to kill me, until Uncle Sev stepped in and asked that I be allowed to assist him in the creation of a potion. Apparently the Dark Lord wanted that potion more than he wanted me dead, so I got off with a couple of Crucios then got sent to work as Sev's personal potion's assistant. We were given until the middle of July to develop a potion that the Dark Lord really wanted. Three weeks ago, we succeeded. Two weeks ago, tomorrow, the Dark Lord forced me to drink it."

"What does the potion do?"

Malfoy stopped pacing and turned empty eyes onto Harry. One of his hands began drifting towards his stomach, before Malfoy seemed to catch what he was doing, balled the hand into a fist, and forced it back to his side.

"It was a male pregnancy potion. The Dark Lord gave us the task of creating a potion that would enable men to carry children. The potion takes a week to work its way through your system, changing your anatomy and messing with hormone levels. You'll be unconscious for most of that week, and incoherent for the rest of it. All you'll be aware of is at first heat and then pain."

"Do you mean?" Harry couldn't bring himself to finish the question. Heat and pain, surely not.

Draco nodded slowly. "I'm sorry, Harry. The Dark Lord has no intentions of killing either of us, because he wants us to bear his heirs."

Draco's tone was of one who'd just announced his own impending execution, and Harry couldn't help but think execution would be preferable to this. His first instincts were the reject the news and call Draco a liar, but slowly and reluctantly he accepted that Draco was speaking the truth because the blond really had no reason to lie to him. Still, Harry couldn't bring himself to even think about the implications of that statement.

"We told the Dark Lord that it took two weeks after consumption for the potion to fully take effect. Honestly, as soon as the transformation is completed after the first week the potion is ready to work. We thought to buy whatever unwilling victims the Dark Lord decided to force-feed the potion an extra seven days in hopes that they would be able to escape before..." Draco let the sentence trail off, but Harry knew what he'd meant to say. An extra seven days before they would become the Dark Lord's unwilling bed partner, and that was putting it mildly.

"But that means..."

Draco nodded solemnly. Tomorrow it would have been two weeks to the day since he'd been given the potion; Draco's time was up. "I never intended on being that Dark Lord's victim, but when he fed me the potion I never held hopes of escape. This is retribution for all the wrongs I've done."

Harry looked at Draco in shock. "Malfoy—Draco, no one deserves this. No one should have to be subjected to what's coming for the two of us."

"Even if that was true, what could I do about it?" Malfoy said. "No one's going to save me, especially after what I've done. The entire world hates me and anyone else unfortunate enough to carry the Malfoy name. Even if I was saved from here, I'd just be sent straight to Azkaban. I know you have a hero complex, Potter, but you're in the same position I am. I've accepted my fate; maybe you should, too."

"Surely even Azkaban would be better than becoming Voldemort's whore and broodmare! Unless you want to carry your precious Dark Lord's children?"

"He's not my Dark Lord; he's my father's and contrary to popular belief, I am not a clone of my father; just as I'm sure you're not a clone of yours. And trust me, Potter, I can think of a lot of people I'd be more willing to bare the children of than the Dark Lord. Hell, even you're more favorable than him. But sometimes you're the dog and sometimes you're the hydrant, and life pisses all over you."

Harry was silent, his mind running a mile a minute trying to find a way out of this situation. Suddenly, what Malfoy—he'd better get used to calling him Draco with the crazy idea he'd just come up with—had said settled like an annoying rash in the back of his mind that wouldn't go away no matter how much he tried to come up with other alternatives.

"You say even I'm more favorable than Voldemort," he said slowly. "Well, I'm not gay or anything, but I find you a million times more desirable than Lord Snake Face."

"Where are you going with this, Potter?" Draco asked hesitantly; he probably did not even want to know what was going through Harry's head.

"Harry, call me Harry, and have you ever heard the saying about choosing the lesser of two evils?"

Draco stared at Harry in confusion, before that was overtaken by a look of comprehension and disbelief. "Are you serious?"

"No. Sirius died fifth year."

"What?"

"My godfather," Harry said, "Sirius. He died fifth year in the Department of Mysteries; maybe your father or your crazy aunt Bellatrix told you about it."

"Potter, do you really think now is the time for jokes made in bad humor?"

"No," Harry admitted, "but you can't really blame me for being a bit out of my mind right now."

Draco seemed to concede that point.

"But what I said earlier, about choosing the lesser of two evils, wasn't a joke. Neither of us actually wants to have Voldemort's child and if given the choice, I'd choose you over him any day."

"So you want us to shag each other in hopes that when he comes we'd have already conceived and thereby ruined his chances of future generations."

"Well, when you put it that way… yeah, that's exactly what I meant."

"You're insane, Potter."

"Yeah, I'm as crazy as a road lizard. I know this is asking a bit much and it's kind of a longshot and I'd love to give you time to think this over, but I have a week to talk myself out of this. You have less than a day to talk yourself into it. And, road lizards may look crazy running in zigzags like they do, but they avoid getting hit don't they?" Harry knew Draco probably didn't understand the analogy—hell, Harry barely understood it himself—but he was sure he'd gotten the basic idea across.

"You said you're not gay," Draco said as if that summed up his hesitance at the situation.

"I'm not," Harry admitted, "But, either way it goes, I'll have to put my own discomfiture aside. Do you really believe there's something to think over right now, Draco? Time is running out."

"I am gay," Draco said, ignoring Harry's words. "I always knew that my father would never approve of it, but it's not like sexuality is something you choose." Draco moved over to the bed and sat down next to Harry, his shoulders hunched over as if they could barely hold the weight they carried. "I mean, at what point in your life did you decide to be straight? I sure as hell didn't wake up one morning and decide to like other boys. I'd just always been that way. Girls never interested me, but still I tried to make myself like them to please my father. I've slept with more girls than you can count on both hands, but I've never been with a boy. Even though I've known that I'm gay for a while, I've never actually slept with a boy. I always thought my first time with a guy, the first time that actually counts, would be something special with someone I loved… and who loved me in return."

"Draco," Harry said slowly, Draco hadn't even looked this vulnerable and afraid in the Astronomy Tower when he was holding Dumbledore at wand point. Harry didn't know how he was supposed to feel. He didn't know what to think. "There's never been any love between the two of us, but…"

"Fine," Draco cut in. "Let's do this. You're right, there's really not anything to think over, so let's just get it over with."

"Draco, I—"

"Harry, this means nothing, and afterward we'll pretend it never happened. I don't want nor need your sympathy."

"Right," Harry said. Slowly he reached over and placed his hand on Draco's thigh; Draco flinched at the touch, but forced himself to relax.

"Just no kissing, ok," Draco said, placing a hand on top of Harry's. "It's too personal. And… and don't worry about hurting me. Don't act like you love me; that would only be insulting."

"Of course," Harry agreed.

For a moment, time stood still as both boys realized just what they were about to do. But time couldn't stand still forever, especially not for fate's favorite fools. Harry swallowed down the lump that had formed in his throat, and set about freeing Draco of his clothes, and with them the last tendrils of hesitation. After a moment, Draco began to reciprocate the effort.

Despite his promise to disregard the other's comfort, Harry was as gentle as possible as he led Draco into a lying down position and settled on top of him. Somewhere deep down inside he knew that he had to be gentle. Voldemort wouldn't be so kind when he came for what he wanted, but Harry could at least try to make this as good as possible for the blond.

Touching Draco was weird. Harry had never touched another boy so intimately before and he found that Draco's body was hard in the places Harry expected softness and sharp where Harry expected curves. It was also strange having Draco be so placid to Harry's actions. He didn't resist when Harry spread his legs, or when he lightly caressed his trembling body. To Harry, this docile Draco was scarier than an angry Draco, so he set about breaking him out of this unnerving compliance. Harry bent over and bit harshly on the milky white skin stretched over Draco's hipbone.

Draco let out a startled gasp and raised his head to lock eyes with Harry. Harry grinned unapologetically as he wrapped a hand around Draco's flaccid member and tugged harshly. Draco moaned and bucked his hips into the touch. "Potter," his tone was one of warning.

"Draco," Harry said back insolently. He didn't really know what he was doing, but he knew that he wanted Draco to at least respond to his efforts. He wouldn't know how to make this feel good if he tried, but he would rather shoot himself than continue with Draco just lying there like a lifeless doll. Draco seemed to get his point and became more receptive to Harry's efforts. He moaned when Harry did something he liked and guided him through the preparation process.

Nothing could have prepared Harry for the feeling he got when he finally slipped inside of Draco. The lack of proper lubrication made the actual penetration harder than it should have been, but being inside Draco felt amazing. Draco was so hot and tight. The muscles squeezed Harry so much he could practically feel every breath Draco took in his cock. Harry just wanted to slam in and out of him relentlessly until he reached completion, Draco's comfort be damned. Still, with the Dark Lord's impending visit, Harry wanted Draco to find at least some pleasure in this action, because surely Voldemort wouldn't be so kind. So, with a concentrated effort, Harry managed to control the urge to thrust unrelenting into Draco's tight hole.

"Shit," Draco hissed, as he panted and tried to adjust to being penetrated.

"Please don't use the word 'shit' while my cock is up your arse," Harry said absently.

"Fuck then," Draco hissed back. Harry decided to ignore the tears of pain trying to escape the corners of Draco's eyes.

"Tell me when it's ok to move."

"Now would be a good time," Draco groaned. "Damn, you're huge, or maybe it just feels that way since I'm not used to have things up my arse."

"Are you're sure it's ok to move?"

"Well, I'm not going to get used to it if you don't do it now will I?"

"Right," Harry said before slowly pulling out and pushing back in. Damn, being inside Malfoy was a glorious feeling. Harry had never felt so hot or surrounded; it was amazing.

"I'm not going to break, Potter, and I'm sure I told you not to worry about hurting me."

"Fine!" Harry snapped, pulling out and slamming hard and fast into Draco's semi-resistant body. Draco screamed and arched off the bed, but Harry disregarded the sound and continued to thrust into the hot body below him.

"Merlin!" Draco groaned. Apparently he'd adjusted to the feeling and was enjoying it if his leaking cock was anything to go by. His eyes were closed and Harry couldn't help but wonder if Draco was pretending it was someone else fucking him right now, someone more desirable than Harry, someone Draco actually loved. Before long, Harry felt the familiar coiling in his belly and was crying his release a he spilled inside of Draco. Draco wrapped a hand around his own cock and tugged a few times, before he too met his release.

"Fuck," Harry groaned, pulling out of Draco and watching the mixture of blood and semen follow his retreat from the abused sphincter and spill onto the bed.

Draco ignored Harry, choosing to get out of the bed as soon as Harry moved enough to allow it and disappear through the only door in the room—Harry noted that it led to the loo. Harry lay across the bad, dazed from the amazing orgasm he'd just had. He never thought having sex with another boy could feel like this. Slowly he came down from his orgasm induced high enough to realize the situation he was in. What he'd just done hadn't been about pleasure at all, and he shouldn't have been so caught up in his own self when Draco had just given up a piece of himself.

A few minutes later, when Draco hadn't returned to the room, Harry went to see if something was wrong. He stood outside the bathroom door, his hand poised to knock, but froze when he heard the sounds coming from the other side. Draco was crying. Harry could hear loud shuddering sobs coming from the other side of the door and it made him reluctant to intrude on the obviously private moment. Still, he knocked softly.

"Draco," he called out.

There was a pause in sound from Draco's side of the door, before Harry could hear a faucet turn on and Draco called back "I'll be out in a minute."

Harry sighed and made his way back over to the bed. He sat staring at the closed door waiting for Draco to come out. A few minutes later, Draco finally reentered the room. "Let's do it again," he said heading straight for the bed.

"What?" Harry asked in surprise.

"You really don't think one time is going to be enough for your crazy plan to work, do you? If we're lucky, the Dark Lord will use a fertility potion so that we conceive the first time. If we're not, we're going to have to deal with repeat visits until he confirms conception. I only have tonight for this scheme of yours to work and doing it just one time is not going to be enough. So, let's do it again."

Harry couldn't bring himself to argue with that logic.

…

They ended up doing it three times before they passed out from exhaustion. Draco had mustered up enough wandless magic to heal his anus so that when the time came Voldemort wouldn't know what they had done. And, even though they'd just been as close as two people could be, as they had lain down to sleep in the single bed the room had to offer, Draco had shied away from Harry's touch and put as much space between them as possible. As Harry had looked at Draco through blurry eyes right before he fell asleep, he was sure he saw the blond's shoulders shaking with silent sobs. Swallowing the lump in his throat, Harry slid closer to Draco and wrapped an arm around him. Even though Draco resisted the touch Harry held on. Finally, Draco rolled to face Harry. Harry gave him a small smile that he knew wasn't at all reassuring, and Draco succumbed to loud sobs that shook his whole body as he hid his face in Harry's neck.

…

Harry woke to his scar hurting.

As that was always a bad sign, Harry jumped from sleep to awake fairly quickly and his hand instinctively groped around for his wand, but didn't find it. Once full wakefulness fell over him, his memories of the past day came, as well as an awareness of the world around him. Draco was sleeping against his chest and there was someone standing over the bed watching them. The pain in his scar told him just who that someone was.

Voldemort wasn't an attractive creature—creature because an anthropomorphic form did not make one automatically a human being; a human being needed a soul, a heart, a conscience, and a nose. The unsightly visage of the self-proclaimed Dark Lord really was the stuff nightmares were made of. Seriously, when recreating a body how hard would it have been to spare a bit of extra cartilage for a nose and some ears? Tom Riddle may have been a handsome man, but his current incarnation wasn't going to win him any beauty pageants. And yes, Harry was very much aware that he was mentally going on about the pointless topic of Voldemort's looks as a way to pretend he wasn't in the situation he was in—a situation defined by a lack of a wand, a helpless blond, and imminent degradation if that leer of Voldemort's face was anything to go by.

Harry gripped Draco a bit tighter in his arms; a protective gesture that he knew would ultimately do nothing in shielding the Malfoy heir from his fate. Still, there was a look of defiance in Harry's green eyes as they met Voldemort's—it was the same defiance a kitten showed a full grown Rottweiler intruding on its territory, sure it looked fierce, but it wouldn't keep him from being swallowed whole. Voldemort silently met his glare with a grin, already confident about his impending victory. And why wouldn't he be confident? He had his greatest enemy confined to a single room, wandless, hopeless, with no contact with the outside world, still a bit weak from the effects of the potion forced on him and the small amount of food he'd received in the past week, and no chance of being saved anytime soon. On a broader scale, he had two gorgeous young men warming his bed, ready—albeit unwilling—to spread their legs for him and carry on future generations of Dark Lords. Yeah, Moldy-balls had every reason to feel confident.

Draco began to stir in Harry's arms. How it's possible for a lipless mouth to smirk, Harry had no idea, but Voldemort somehow managed to pull it off. Right before his pulled out his wand and hit Harry with a body bind.

"You should be happy to have a front row seat for the show, Potter."

"Harry!" Draco said, now fully awake, he sat up and looked worriedly over at Harry. Harry tried to express reassurance with his eyes, as the rest of him couldn't fight the body bind. But any reassurance he might have managed to express was lost in an instant, because Voldemort chose that moment to make his move.

Long, too thin fingers traced the side of Draco's face, pulling the blond's attention away from Harry and towards the evil lurking in the room. Draco visibly flinched away from the touch, but that just fueled the Dark Lord's pleasure.

"Young Mr. Malfoy," Voldemort said, "you have no idea how much I've been looking forward to this." The fingers clenched a handful of Draco's platinum blond hair and yanked him towards the monster, causing the boy to whimper pitifully. A wave of Voldemort's wand left Draco naked and those blood red eyes roving over his nude form was enough to turn Harry's stomach. "Yes, I'm going to enjoy this very much." He released Draco's hair and threw the blond back onto the bed. Another wand wave had Draco's hands bound to the headboard, and another removed Voldemort's clothes and left him hovering over the bed in all his revolting glory.

Draco seemed dead. He put up no resistance as Voldemort spread his legs and situated himself between them. He obediently opened his mouth at the Dark Lord's instruction and allowed what Harry could only assume to be a fertility potion to be poured down his throat. Harry didn't know what to think of this docile Draco; because this wasn't the Draco he'd known in school. The Draco he knew wouldn't have been so accepting this fate.

Harry tried to block out what came next. He pulled himself deep inside his mind in order to get away from the Dark Lord's words, but nothing could distract him from the obvious jostling of the bed as Voldemort moved himself into position…and then Draco screamed and Harry felt himself die a little bit inside.

…

Long after Voldemort had come and gone, Harry lay unmoving on the bed next to a sobbing Draco Malfoy. The body bind that had been cast on him had been removed when the Dark Lord left, but Harry couldn't bring himself to move. Draco had curled himself into a ball and trembled as he cried. Harry wanted to comfort him, but all he could think to say was that 'everything is going to be alright'; he knew Draco wouldn't want to hear that, and he knew even as he thought it that it was a lie, so he said nothing. Still, Harry could not bear hearing the blond's cries, so he willed himself to turn over and do something about it.

"Draco," Harry said softly, placing a hand on the crying boy's shoulder. Draco flinched away from the touch and tried to put as much space between the two of them as possible. Unfortunately he was too close to the edge of the bed when he tried to move away and Draco fell to the floor with a loud whimper. Harry moved slowly over to peer at the blond on the floor; he felt as if he was in the company of a frightened animal and that any sudden movement or sound would set Draco off. How did one approach a rape victim directly after their rape? What did one say to the aforementioned victim? Would it be best to just ignore the purple elephant in the polka-dot tutu sipping tea in the corner of the room? Did situations such as these cause everyone to slip to the other side of sanity like it seemed to do Harry?

"Draco," he tried again, reaching a hand towards the other boy. Obviously he'd been otherwise occupied the day God gave out the common sense that rape victims did not like to be touched. Obviously having Draco throw himself out of the bed to avoid being touched hadn't clued Harry in on that little tidbit of information either.

This time Draco let out a keening sound somewhere between a sob and a scream as he scrambled away from Harry's outstretched hand as fast as he could. It wasn't until Draco's back met with the wall on the other side of the room and the blond looked franticly around the room for somewhere to run that Harry realized that perhaps physical contact wasn't the best way to console a rape victim—and here he was thinking that a hug could cure anything. Not for the first time since waking up in this room, Harry questioned his own sanity. Like all animals, human beings weren't meant for life in captivity, and though Harry had only be awake and aware of this captive state for less than forty-eight hours he was already slipping into the madness brought upon by unwanted confinement. It also didn't help that he'd just witnessed something that could fracture the strongest of minds.

Grasping hold of the last tendrils of sanity and common sense available to him, Harry slowly pulled back his outstretched hand and scooted back to the other side of the bed to allow Draco the space he obviously needed. Something akin to relief flickered in Draco's jaded eyes, and the blond quickly took Harry's retreat as the sign of goodwill that it was. Still, there did not seem to be enough space between them in that one room to allow Draco any comfort, so the Malfoy quickly made his own retreat and once again took refuge in the bathroom.

Not knowing what else to do—but being sure there was nothing he could do for Draco—Harry laid down on the bed and fell into a fitful sleep.

…

Harry woke slowly. His senses returned to their wakened state one by one. The sheets of the bed felt cool when he stretched his arms out, a somewhat comforting sensation when compared to the stale smelling air in the room. The constant hum of silence muffled his ears, broken only by the sounds of breathing. His tongue, thick and heavy in his mouth, found neither a pleasant nor foul taste to greet his wakefulness with. His eyes opened to dim lighting, but that was nothing new.

His deductive reasoning skills were next to wake. The fact that the bed sheets were cool next to him meant that the bed had been empty for a while which led to the conclusion that Draco had most likely never returned to the bed. That was both possible and probable since Draco was so obviously averse to physical contact. But the fact that it wasn't only his breathing breaking the silence meant that Draco had at least returned from his sojourn in the bathroom.

Harry sat up and scanned the room for his fellow prisoner. Draco was sitting on the floor, back pressed against the wall, next to the door to the bathroom. His legs were drawn up towards his chest with his thighs pressed together but his feet spread apart. His arms lay casually over his knees. His head was bowed with his eyes fixed on some invisible spot in his lap. The whole pose projected and air of vulnerability and defeat. Harry didn't like seeing him this way.

"Draco," he said, because what else could he say?

"We should have done it again," Draco said before Harry could say anything else. "After he was done, we should have done it again. With the fertility potion he gave me there would have been a better chance. If I wasn't such a wuss… Damn it all to hell! It doesn't matter how many times we did it before if I was too much of a damn pansy to do it when it counted."

"Draco, you can't blame yourself for that. You'd just been raped; it goes without saying that you would have been too upset to even think about having sex."

Draco sighed. "It doesn't matter now. My bed is made; now it's you we have to worry about. We have a week to get you pregnant before he comes back."

…

Harry wasn't sure what he'd expected sex with a man to be like and he'd never thought he'd be in the position to find out. Strange, foreign, and intrusive we're words barely able to even begin describing the feeling of having Draco's fingers up his arse. He didn't even want to think about how it was going to feel having the blond's cock up there in the next minute or so. He distracted himself by focusing on the insignificant details about the situation—such as the fact that Draco's hair was a complete mess, the sheets of the bed were scratchy against his back, and sweat was beading across Draco's nose.

He winced when Draco slipped the third finger in and began scissoring them. There was a water stain on the ceiling above the bed. A spider was building a web in the corner of the room. His nose was itching. Draco pulled the fingers out and verbalized a low warning, before he started pressing something much bigger inside of Harry. Harry closed his eyes and tried to will his body to relax—not an easy feat when everything in him was screaming to eject the foreign invader. Harry wasn't sure if he'd ever get used to this, so he told Draco not to bother with waiting for him adjust.

That it was painful went without saying. It was also far too intimate, and maybe a little too demeaning, to warrant voluntarily repeating the action. Draco tried to be gentle at least. At one point, Harry thought he'd felt something that might have been pleasure, but it was gone so fast he wasn't sure if he'd imagined it or not. A while later, he felt it again and realized that Draco was touching something inside of him that was an obvious erogenous zone. Unfortunately it wasn't a pleasurable enough sensation to make him want to submit to sex with another man for the rest of his life. At least Draco was enjoying it. The blond deserved at least that much after all that he'd been through. Harry had enjoyed the dominating position of sodomizing as well, but it seemed Draco could find pleasure in both giving and receiving—that is when the receiving side didn't consist of being raped by a snake-faced bastard.

Harry didn't find enough pleasure in the act to reach any stage of arousal—the pleasure he found was too short lived for more than the barest stirring in his groin area—but Draco reached orgasm soon enough and sprayed Harry's inside with his warm seed. Harry found this to be a very strange sensation, having another man's jism inside him. Harry decided that he didn't completely hate what they had just done, after he got passed the initial pain and beat back his discomfort of being touched in such a way, he actually felt pretty neutral towards the whole affair. Perhaps his mind was beginning to crack, or perhaps his neutrality stemmed from the fact that he knew he would have to repeat this act and he needed a coping mechanism to help him through it. Whatever the reason, Harry agreed that he was willing to do this twice a day for the week leading up until Voldemort's next visit, and he made Draco promise that no matter what his emotional state afterward they would do it again while the fertility potion was still in his system.

…

"I'm in love with Severus, you know." Draco said at random. "I've been in love with him for a long time. I've known him all my life; he's my godfather after-all. I've always had the utmost respect for him. As a child, I felt as if he loved me more than my father did, so I decided I would love him more than my father as well. He was always there for me. More than once, he was the one to wipe my tears and heal my bruises after my father had hurt me either emotionally or physically. I know others see him as this cold, evil person who's not even attractive. But I think I'm the only person who knows the real Severus Snape. He's so caring and has such a capacity to love. I mean, when he loves someone he loves them deeply and so completely there's no room for anyone other than them in his heart. Even when he knows it is love unrequited, he still loves them with the entirety of his very being. I found that to be a beauty of its own form. I always wished that I was the one on the receiving end of such passionate love.

"I told him how I felt the summer after fourth year. I knew that he wouldn't return my feelings, but I had to try. He puts up such a cold front, but Severus is really just a fragile man afraid of being hurt. He doesn't like letting people in, but he's too afraid to be alone. He doesn't like taking risks, but he can't help falling in love. He's such a beautiful contradiction. He told me that I was confused and that I'd mistaken respect for love or that I had substituted one type of love for another. Surely I loved him as one would love a father, he said. I told him he was wrong. I told him that I loved him with a force rivaled only by his love for—anyway, he told me that I was mistaken and that I'd picked the worst time to come to him saying such things. He told me if we lived through the coming war and I still thought I felt this way then I should talk to him after the smoke clears.

"The more time that passes, I find that I only love him more. The more I learn about him, the surer I am that he's the one for me. I find that the force with which he loves is only contested by his loyalty. When this war ends, I'm going to run right into his arms and hold him so tight that he won't have no choice but take me into his heart, because I'll meld us together as one. I love him that much."

Harry listened to Draco and thought about his own life. He'd never felt a love even remotely comparable to the one Draco was speaking of. At the end of the last school year, Harry was convinced he was in love with Ginny, but he wasn't so sure anymore. Ginny was an amazing person and Harry cared deeply for her, but love was something he'd never truly felt before and he wasn't sure how to recognize it. He knew his feelings for Ginny were different than those for Hermione, but that wasn't saying much because Hermione obviously played the role of an older sister in his life. And the fact that Ginny had been in love with him for so long made Harry question whether or not it was him she actually loved and not the Boy-Who-Lived. Ginny had loved him since before the two of them really knew each other, so didn't that mean she was just in love with the idea of him?

Figuring it was best not to dwell on it now, Harry closed his eyes and hoped that he would eventually feel a love as strong as the one Draco had.

…

"Potter, why didn't you fight me?"

"What?"

"You woke up in a strange room with only me. You didn't even try to look for your wand. You didn't try to escape. You didn't treat me like an enemy and try to fight me. And you took every word I said as fact without questioning me. Why?"

Harry didn't know how to answer. How could he say that he'd never even considered fighting Draco or that the blond might be lying to him. From the moment he'd woken up, he'd just known that he and Draco was on the same side and that he shouldn't question it. He'd just felt it in his gut and the memory of the night in the tower had only served to strengthen that feeling.

Silence hung between them, before Harry finally decided to speak. "I was there that night in the Astronomy Tower. I saw everything."

"You were there? Why? How?"

"Dumbledore and I were away from the school that night. He'd had a hunch about something that proved false. We'd thought we'd found a way to destroy Voldemort, but it seem that we were purposely misled. We were in Hogsmeade when we saw the Mark over the tower. He headed there directly. He made me hide when you came. There was nothing I could do."

"And you saw everything?"

"Yes. I saw everything. I saw you pleading for your mother's life and how torn up you were. I saw that he was going to give you a chance. I saw that you're not a killer."

"And that's why you trust me?"

"That and because of your eyes. Your eyes are honest no matter what lies fall from your lips."

…

When Voldemort came Draco had once again barricaded himself in the bathroom. Harry was sitting in the bed, waiting for what was to come. Thoughts of rebellion had fled him long ago at this point. Voldemort approached and all Harry could think was at least Draco had gotten himself out of having to play witness to this scene.

Voldemort actually seemed quite surprised by how compliant Harry was being. Most likely he'd expected a fight, because surely Harry Bloody Potter wasn't just going to lay back and think of England when he was about to be raped by his sworn enemy. But Harry knew that resistance would only bring him more pain in the long run. So, he obediently swallowed the fertility potion he was given and he held his tongue as Voldemort spelled his clothes away. When the actual act started, Harry had hidden himself inside his mind and watched from behind empty eyes with a strange detachment that may be a precursor to serious mental health issues in the near future.

Voldemort was not a gentle lover—if you could apply the word 'lover' to the give situation—and Harry felt kind of bad for the boy lying on the bed suffering the Dark Lord's attention. That poor child, he must be really hurting; he was crying and most likely bleeding as well. His whole body was trembling. Harry wished he could help the boy. He wished there was something he could do that would make this better for him. It was really too bad that Harry was too far away to offer any aid. The poor child would have to suffer alone. Harry wondered if the boy knew he was crying. Did he feel the sobs wracking through his chest, or was he too distracted by the pain being inflicted on him elsewhere? It really was a pitiful sight. But, at least it seemed the man was done now. Yes, he was done. He was putting his clothes back on and saying words Harry was sure the boy on the bed couldn't hear.

He was leaving now. That's good. Perhaps now the boy could sleep? No? Not yet, you say. What more can the fates have in store for that poor child? Another visitor? Another lover? This time it was a blond boy. The blond looked pretty upset as well. He kept apologizing. Why? Why was he apologizing? Did he not want to hurt the boy? Then why was he doing this? At least he was more gentle than the man. The boy was still crying, but the blond was crying as well. Isn't that a miserable sight: two crying boys on a bed, clinging to each other? Harry felt sorry for both of them. At least it was over now. Now they could both rest. That's good. They needed their rest. Harry would stay awake and watch over them. At least he will try. His eyes were feeling so heavy. Harry was sleepy as well. Maybe he'd sleep for just a little while. Surely nothing would hurt the boys if he only slept for a little bit…

…

They hadn't spoken much since Voldemort's last visit. There was nothing for either of them to say. Draco usually sat on the floor near the bathroom door, looking much like he had the day after Voldemort had visited him. Harry had taken to sitting on the floor opposite Draco. Neither of them went near the bed. They measured the passing of the days by how often the house elves brought food. Three meals a day, sleep, then repeat. Draco hardly touched his food. What he did eat didn't stay down. Harry barely managed to eat and keep down just a little more than Draco. Sixty-five meals, twenty-one days, passed in silence, before something finally happened.

The room was so silent that every little sound seemed that much louder. Then something in the air seemed to shift and the two of them were no longer alone; Harry and Draco both pushed through the thick layers of apathy that was clouding their senses and turned to see who had deemed them worthy of a visit.

Voldemort entered first, and Harry was sure the man's presence should have affected him more than this. Surely the sight of the snake-faced rapist was supposed to fill Harry with something akin to fear or hatred. But no, Voldemort entered the room and the thick strands of apathy he'd been floating in only clung to him tighter. Perhaps it's because there was nothing Voldemort could do that Harry that he hadn't already done before.

The person who entered after Voldemort surprised Harry only because no one other than Voldemort and the house elves had been in the room since Harry arrived, but for some reason Harry had known if Voldemort would bring a guest into the room with him it would be one of two people: Lucius Malfoy or Severus Snape.

Harry glanced at Draco. The blond was hiding his face in shame at the sight of the second visitor. Harry felt a stirring of pity within him for a second. Poor Draco. Why did it have to be Severus that saw him like this? Harry was sure his fellow captive would have much more preferred Lucius to play witness to his shame than Severus. He was in love with Severus after all, and barely respected his father at all.

"Hello my lovelies," Voldemort greeted. "You two are doing well, I hope." Harry wondered if the peppy greeting was genuine or if Voldemort was trying to be funny. Either way, all he received was a blank stare from Harry, and a nearly inaudible whimper from Draco, who was still hiding his face in shame.

Apparently the Dark Lord was genuinely in a good mood, because he didn't react to the lack of reaction in the way Harry expected. In fact, Voldemort completely ignored the fact that Harry and Draco seemed to be ignoring him.

"Don't mind us," the much too chipper Dark Lord said, "Severus and I are only here to run a quick test. We'll be gone in a jiff."

He nodded towards Snape, and the Potions Master silently stepped forward and pulled out his wand. He mumbled a spell and waved the wand first towards Draco, then Harry. Severus put his wand away and turned to face the (impatiently) waiting Dark Lord.

"Everything is going to plan, My Lord," Snape said.

Harry decided that Voldemort had either had a sudden change in personality or he was high off of something, because the supposed "Dark" Lord let out a life that sound downright giddy and Harry half expected him to start jumping up and down and clapping his hands from his excitement. Instead, the Lord of the No Noses strode across the room and grabbed a fistful of Draco's hair.

"You did quite well, Severus," Voldemort said as he used his grip on the blond strands to yank Draco to his feet and thrust him towards Snape. "Here is your reward."

It looked to Harry as if Snape caught Draco as a reflex. He held the blond in his arms and looked at his master confusedly. "I don't understand, My Lord."

Voldemort grinned and walked across the room to where Harry was still sitting against the wall watching the scene playing out impassively. "I was under the impression, Severus, that you and the younger Malfoy had a special relationship. Was I mistaken?"

Snape didn't seem to know how to answer. "Draco is my godson, My Lord; that is full extent of our relationship."

Voldemort was now standing over Harry, petting his hair as casually as one would pet a dog. "Be that as it may, you cannot deny that he is a beautiful boy. Why not have a bit of fun with him?"

"I couldn't possibly, My Lord."

The fingers in Harry's hair stopped their petting and balled into a fist. Harry whimpered from the sudden pain, but did nothing to try to escape the Dark Lord's grip. Dark red eyes locked on Severus and Voldemort's voice had none of its former giddiness. "If the boy was good enough for me to bed, Severus, what makes him not worthy of you? Are you proclaiming yourself too good for my things?"

"Not at all, My Lord," Snape said quickly. "I only meant that my relationship with Draco prior to now makes me unable to see him in a sexual light. Potter, on the other hand, I find quite tempting."

Long, spindly fingers resumed their petting of Harry's hair as Voldemort seemed to think over the words Snape had spoken. "Ok, then," Voldemort said thoughtfully. Harry whimpered again as his hair was once more clenched in a tight fist. Voldemort used his grip to pull Harry into a standing position and throw him towards Snape. "Have at him," he said.

Suddenly, Harry was leaning against Snape's firm chest with the Potions Master's arms the only thing holding him up. "Thank you, My Lord," Harry heard Snape say, but it sounded as if those words were spoken from the other end of a long tunnel as Harry's brain was screaming too loud for him to hear properly. Surely what he thought was about to happen wasn't really going to happen.

It seemed all it took to wash away the thick sludge of apathy was the anticipation of another rape. Harry was so busy drowning in his panicking thoughts he didn't even notice Snape guiding him over to the bed, banishing their clothes and settling between Harry's spread thighs.

Harry stared up at Snape with frightened green eyes, silently pleading for this not to be happening. Snape's eyes were soft and apologetic even as he lifted Harry's legs and lined himself up with his trembling hole. 'I'm sorry,' Snape seemed to being saying, but then he was pushing inside and Harry could no longer see his eyes through his own tears.

Harry retreated into the safe place he'd found within his mind and hoped he could just stay there until this was all over.

…

It was so sad to see that poor boy in this position yet again. Why couldn't they just leave him alone? Why did they keep hurting him like this? What had he done wrong?

It broke his heart to see those empty green eyes staring blankly at the ceiling glossed over by a sheen of tears. The man above him kept moving, thrusting into his body regardless of the poor boy's feelings. And the other man was there too. The demon who'd hurt him like this the first time. He was standing there watching and holding the other boy in his arms.

The little blond boy looked just as broken and empty as the shell of the boy on the bed. The demon was touching him and he was crying.

This wasn't fair! Why did everyone keep hurting these poor boys! Why was this happening to them! What kind of monsters did this to poor innocent children?

Those poor boys; so lost and broken.

And the evil men kept hurting them. They were still hurting them! Why wouldn't they stop hurting them already! Why wouldn't they just die! They deserved to die!

Die.

Die!

DIE!

…

When asked later, neither Harry nor Draco could say exactly how the Dark Lord and Severus Snape died.

It happened too sudden and without warning.

It happened in an instant between one heart beat and the next.

Severus was still inside of Harry when he died and Voldemort had his hand wrapped around Draco's cock.

Harry had lain there under Severus' corpse for lord only knows how long and Draco had retreated to the farthest corner of the room and had cried until he puked.

As Fate would have it, with the Dark Lord's death the wards keeping Harry from being found fell and Ronald Weasley, in a fit of angst over the fact that his best friend still hadn't been found had angrily cast a "Point Me" spell that hadn't work the first million times he'd tried it, but a million and one time's the charm, and was surprised to discover that the spell actually worked.

When the Order of the Phoenix burst down the wall of the doorless room where the boys were imprisoned, they didn't know what to think of the sight before them.

Harry was lying, near catatonic, on the bed naked and with the corpse of Severus Snape still on top of him. Draco was in a corner, disgustingly close to a pool of his own vomit, naked from the waist down and sobbing hysterically. Voldemort's corpse laid on the floor with a look of sick pleasure eternally etched across his face.

No one knew what to say, so they said nothing more than what was needed to be said in order to get the boys out of the room and to the nearest Port-key to Hogwarts' infirmary.


	2. ...Is About When to Break...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello everyone, welcome to the long awaited Part II of Break Before We Fall. So, I feel the need to point out a couple of things about this story. First, it was never in the plans for Harry and Draco to end up together. I just don't see this story going in that direction for multiple reasons that I will happily explain to you in PM if you request, just know that it's not happening. Though I am considering having at least one of them have a relationship with someone by the end (right now it looks like it might be Blaise/Draco). 
> 
> Two, the reason that I'm breaking this story into "parts" instead of "chapters" is because I want the non-continue option. By that, I mean I want people to be able to read part one, feel that it's complete and don't feel obligated to continue to part two, but if they do read part two, I want them to also feel it's complete so they don't have to continue to part 3 and so on. Part one should read like a one-shot, added with part two is should read like a two-shot and so on. That being said, I'm going to leave the story complete even as I work on adding chapters. 
> 
> Three, there'll be an ending note on this chapter in order to clarify something I think a lot of people might not understand.

Draco had stopped speaking. Actually, Draco had stopped living. True, he was still breathing and his heart was still beating, but he wasn't living. He was in a near catatonic state. He just sat there. Staring. He sat there looking out through empty, lifeless eyes. Looking, but not seeing. He responded to other people. If someone told him to do something, he would do it. But he did not speak. He did not see. He was broken. He was dead.

Everyone wondered what was going on inside his head. His mind was much more active than the rest of him if the high level of Beta brainwaves that kept showing up on scans was anything to go by. He was always thinking about something. Sometimes tears would well up in his eyes and spill down over his cheeks. But still he just sat there. Staring. Broken. Dead.

Harry, sometimes, wished he was broken as well. Since he was the only one responsive, all the questions were being asked to him. He didn't want to answer the questions. He didn't want to talk about what happened in that godforsaken room with no door. He didn't even want to think about it. If he thought about it, he would end up like Draco. Trapped in the unending images and memories of an experience better forgotten. So lost that all he could do was sit there. Stare. Break. Die.

After a while, Harry had stopped speaking, too.

* * *

 

Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, PTSD.

That is what they were calling it. The monster that now lived within Harry and Draco, corrupting their dreams, controlling their thoughts, and stealing their words. PTSD is what kept Draco trapped inside that room with no door even though they were no longer there. PTSD is what kept Harry too frightened to try to help free Draco. PTSD is what crept in when it was least expected, making Harry see over and over again first Draco being raped, then him being raped, then Severus' eyes saying how sorry he was.

* * *

 

There were too many people in the room. Faces, both familiar and unfamiliar, surrounded Harry. Voices, high pitched and low, called out their questions. Bodies, hard and soft, pressed in around him.

Harry closed his eyes and tried to will them away. He didn't like having so many people around. He didn't know what to think. He didn't know if they were safe. His time spent in the room with no door had taught him that only one person was safe. Anyone else who entered the room only wanted to hurt him.

Harry didn't want to be hurt anymore.

He wanted the people to go away.

_Go away._ He whispered inside his head.  _Go away._

The people all left.

* * *

 

At night, Harry could hear him.

Draco cried and tossed and turned in his sleep. He pleaded and whimpered and kicked and screamed. He called out for Severus.

During the day, Draco never spoke.

Draco just sat there. Staring. Broken. Dead.

But at night…

An unfamiliar feeling wormed its way into Harry's heart every time he heard Draco call out for Severus.

Poor Draco. It must really hurt to lose the person you loved. Poor Draco.

Harry wished Severus hadn't died. Maybe if he was here, he could help fix Draco.

Harry didn't like seeing Draco broken. He wished he could do something to make him better. But there was nothing Harry could do. The only one who could do anything would have been Severus. Because Draco loved Severus. Draco loved Severus and Severus had been sorry. Severus had been sorry and Draco had loved Severus.

Severus should not have died.

Harry wondered who had killed him.

* * *

 

One morning, Draco had gotten out of his hospital bed and ran for the bathroom. Harry could hear him sicking up from the other side of the door.

Harry frowned.

Madam Pomfrey went to the bathroom to see what was wrong. The door was locked and Madam Pomfrey started fretting, asking Draco to come out and talk to her.

Harry could hear Draco crying.

Madam Pomfrey pulled out her wand and waved it at the door. Harry wanted to call out to her and tell her no. He wanted to tell her not to go in there.

Back in the room with no door, the bathroom had been a sanctuary. Harry never bothered Draco when he was in there. Draco had never bothered Harry when he was in there. The bathroom was a safe place.

Harry wanted to call out to Madam Pomfrey and stop her from violating the sanctity of that room. But he did not. He did not speak.

Madam Pomfrey opened the door.

For the first time in the light of day, Draco screamed.

* * *

Harry hadn't told anyone the exact details of what had gone on in that room. Telling someone would make it real.

But Madam Pomfrey had seen something on her scans that confused her. She repeated the scans over and over again, unable to accept the results as real.

Something in her must have broken as well.

She fell to her knees beside Harry's bed and burst into tears. She apologized, but Harry didn't understand why.

"Oh, Harry, I'm so so sorry. I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry. I'm so…"

Harry looked at her and frowned. Why was she apologizing? She had done nothing wrong. He reached out a shaking hand and placed it on her shoulder. She looked up at him through teary eyes. Harry's frowned deepened. This was not right. This was not Poppy. What had happened to the fearsome woman who ruled her hospital with an iron fist?

Harry wanted to do something to make her feel better. He did not like seeing her so weak.

"No tears," He said in a voice raspy from disuse.

This just made her cry harder.

* * *

 

"While running some scans, I discovered multiple magical signatures coming from both Mr. Potter and Mr. Malfoy. I'd thought that maybe there were both under the effect of some curse or other that didn't show up on normal diagnosis scans. That is what made me try different forms of diagnosis. All my tests and scans have led to the same results."

"And you're certain these results are correct, Poppy?"

"Yes, I've repeated the tests multiple times, on both of them. Many of these tests are powerful bits of magic with very little margin for error. I'm one hundred percent certain."

"But it's impossible. They're boys."

Harry frowned. "Anything is possible with magic."

* * *

 

After Harry had started talking again, they wouldn't let him stop until he'd told the whole story.

He told them about the heat and the pain and the potion and the plan and the rape and the fear.

He told them everything except the most important thing.

He hadn't wanted to, but the moment he started speaking the words continued to pour out against his will. A dam had broken and it couldn't be plugged. The words kept coming until there was none left. The only thing he managed to hold back was their choice. The words about the choice he and Draco had made were all that he could hold back.

Afterward, he felt a little bit lighter. A little bit better.

* * *

 

Draco was crying again.

Harry looked over at him through the dim lighting of the empty Hospital Wing. He yearned to make him better. He wanted to fix the broken boy. But Harry was broken, too. Could he pull Draco together when he himself was still in pieces?

Harry got out his bed and made his way through the darkness towards Draco.

Draco whimpered loudly and scuttled away when he felt his bed dip when Harry climbed in. Harry lay down next to Draco. The blond whimpered again, but did not move away. Harry wrapped an arm around Draco. The blond flinched. Harry stayed still. Draco relaxed slightly and moved closer to Harry. Harry held Draco against his chest protectively.

Draco sobbed.

"Severus."

* * *

 

"This test will serve to discern the paternity of the fetus. As you two are  _special_ cases I cannot be certain of the accuracy test. We'll start with you, Mr. Malfoy."

Madam Pomfrey drew her wand and cast a spell.

"Mr. Malfoy, your child is fathered by Tom Riddle, Jr."

Draco did not make a sound, but the look of complete devastation on his face said enough. Madam Pomfrey seemed torn and unsure of herself, something Harry had never seen before. The Matron gave Draco a sad look before turning to Harry. Harry hardly noticed her casting a spell on him; distracted he was by Draco's tormented expression.

* * *

 

"You mean you  _chose_ to sleep with Malfoy? That's disgusting."

"Try to see things my way, would you! You weren't there. You don't know what it was like for us. You don't know what we went through. And you can't make me regret my choice. You don't know, so don't judge us."

"Harry, he didn't mean to offend you. We're not judging; you just caught us off guard is all."

"We were standing on the edge of a cliff and Voldemort was ready to push us off. There was no doubt we would break once we reached the bottom but we'd have to suffer the fall first. Or we could break ourselves before he pushed us so there was less to lose in the fall. In the end we would still be broken, but at least this way it was on our terms."

"It was a choice between a controlled break and a scattered shatter. If you wanted to be able to put the pieces back together afterward, which would you have chosen?"

Everyone turned to Draco and stared in disbelief.

Harry smiled softly. For some reason, he was really happy to hear Draco's voice again.

* * *

 

"Mr. Potter, Mr. Malfoy," McGonagall said, standing a few feet from the foot of the bed where the two of them were laying together, "It's time we had a discussion about your future."

Harry sat up and looked at the Headmistress curiously. Draco was curled up against his side with his head resting on Harry's shoulder. Harry briefly wondered when had Draco gotten so small and docile and when had the two of them become so comfortable with each other.

"What do you want to talk about?" Harry asked, wrapping a protective arm around Draco.

"The school term has already started, but if you two are dedicated enough you could easily catch up with your peers. If you do not wish to complete your education, you're welcome to stay here at Hogwarts until you make arrangements to move elsewhere. Madam Pomfrey has agreed to take charge of your prenatal care for the duration of your pregnancy unless you wish for a different care provider."

"I'm not having his baby."

The words were spoken so softly, Harry almost missed them even though Draco was so close to him.

"What was that, Mr. Malfoy?" McGonagall asked, having actually missed the words.

"I said I'm not having his baby. You can't possibly think I'll willingly bring the child of that  _monster_ into this world."

"Mr. Malfoy, I understand that you're quite upset about these circumstances…"

"Upset? I'm more than upset! And you can't possibly understand! You weren't there. You don't know what I lived through. You don't know what he did. We can tell you all about it, but you still wouldn't know because  _you weren't there_."

"Regardless, Mr. Malfoy, you don't have much choice in the matter. Madam Pomfrey has already looked into it; because of the nature of the potion involved an attempt at terminating the pregnancy would put your life in danger."

"No choice. That seems to be the story of my life."

"But you do have choices, Mr. Malfoy. Even though termination is no longer available for you, there are other options."

Draco didn't seem to be listening. He'd pulled himself out of Harry's arms and lay on the bed curled in on himself.

Harry frowned, but said nothing and made no move to get Draco to reengage with the world outside his mind.

* * *

 

It was due to more than a little peer pressure from more than a few sources that Harry decided to start classes.

There was something terrifying about the very idea of being in a room surrounded by people with wands. Harry knew that he was far from ready to interact with his classmates, but Hermione and Ron and Ginny and McGonagall and Remus and almost all the Gryffindors were encouraging him to try.

Madam Pomfrey encouraged him to take as much time as he wanted before leaving the sanctuary of the Hospital Wing to engage the world. When he made his decision, she also made a decision. He was not to return to the dorms just yet. He was to return to the Hospital at the end of each school day and subject himself to her care.

Draco hadn't made a decision about going back to class. He hadn't made a decision about anything. He spent his days curled up in his hospital bed ignoring the outside world. He didn't even let Harry close anymore. He'd stopped talking again, too. This time it was a conscious choice to not speak, and that made his silence even more unbearable.

* * *

 

The first day Harry was to return to class, he was sure he'd be unable to do it. He stood at the door to the Hospital Wing terrified of what lay beyond the barrier. In front of him Hermione, Ron, and Ginny stood in the hall waiting for him. Behind him, Draco lay on his bed curled in on himself staring out behind empty eyes still seeing the insides of a room with no door.

Harry closed his eyes and took a step forward.

* * *

 

Harry supposed he should be used to people staring at and whispering about him. Still, it was a bit overwhelming to suddenly be under such scrutiny.

Everyone was looking at him. Pointing towards him. Whispering about him. Pressing in around him. Shouting their questions. Yelling their sentiments. Reaching for him. Grabbing at him. Pinning him down. Pushing themselves on him. Having their way with him.

Harry froze. His mind retreated.

With a familiar strange detachment, Harry watched the poor boy below him. That poor boy. Alone in the middle of a crowd. Tears streaming down his cheeks. Surrounded by people who all seemed to want a piece of him.

Those stupid people. Didn't they realize they were scaring him? Didn't they see he was hurting? Why wouldn't they leave him alone? Why wouldn't they go away?

That poor boy. Curled in on himself on the floor. Crying out from deep within. Staring through empty eyes.

People standing around him. Staring. Whispering. Pointing.

Why didn't they just go away? If they weren't going to help him, they should just leave. They should disappear. They should die.

"Back away!" A voice yelled. "Get away from him! Go on about your day before I curse you all and deny you treatment."

Oh.

They're leaving.

They're gone.

That's good.

Harry was tired.

He wanted to rest.

* * *

Harry woke to the sound of yelling.

"Mr. Malfoy! Mr. Malfoy, please open the door! Mr. Malfoy, please!"

Madam Pomfrey banged on the door of the loo, her voice dripping with desperation.

" _Alohamora! Finite Incantatem!_ Mr. Malfoy, please!" The spells hit the door to no avail. The Matron drew her wand arm back as far as she could and swept it forwards towards the door in an angry jerky movement. " _Reducto!"_

The door exploded. Madam Pomfrey rushed into the room, her feet splashing in the pool of water on the floor.

Harry heard a scream, then some shouted spells, frustrated yelling, more spells, the sound of slapping flesh, splashing water, prayers, pleas…coughing, a sigh of relief, chastisement.

Harry frowned. Yawned. Rolled over. Fell asleep.

* * *

 

Draco was pale. His hair was messy. His lips dry. His skin cold.

Harry held his hand as he sat beside the blond's bed.

Upon waking, his mind had slowly filled with half forgotten events glimpsed through a cloud of exhaustion, piecing the bits together like a jigsaw puzzle until the formed a coherent picture.

Draco had tried to commit suicide the night before.

The truth had fallen over him like a lead blanket, dragging Harry down to the depths of disbelief and depression.

How could Draco have done something so stupid and selfish?

How could he have even considered suicide as a plausibly solution?

How could he think it would be ok to leave Harry all alone?

Harry's hand wrapped around Draco's cold one and rubbed gentle circles across the back of it. Draco moved in his sleep. A familiar whimper escaped his mouth.

"Severus."

Harry looked at Draco's pale face. Sadness and anger welled up inside of him.

How could Severus have done something so selfish?

How could he think his death was in any way acceptable?

How could he think it would be ok to leave Draco all alone?

* * *

 

"So you couldn't survive out there in the real world after all?"

"So you couldn't survive in here by yourself after all?"

"It's just, I think I saw you as my hope. If anyone could get over this, it would be you. And I've spent six years telling myself that there's nothing you can do that I can't. If you can move on then so could I. But you couldn't. And if you can't how could I possibly?"

"But I can get passed this. We both can. It was just a little too soon. Eventually, though, I know we'll both be able to move on."

"There's nothing waiting for me out there. I'm an outcast, a screw up, a Death Eater, a fool. I can't do anything right. I couldn't even kill myself right."

"One day you'll realize that last failure was a good thing."

* * *

 

"Mr. Potter, Mr. Malfoy, in light of recent events, I find myself incapable of providing you with the proper treatment for your situation. I've reached the limit of the care I'm able to give you and have acknowledged that limitation. I think it would be in your best interests to seek out a professional from now on."

"A professional? What kind of professional?"

"Mind healing is a branch of Medi-wizardry that I am not qualified for. I'd wanted to keep you exclusively under my care, desperately telling myself that I'd be able to handle all your needs, but I realize now that my lack of qualifications hinders more than helps your healing. I still wish to see to your physical healing, but for the treatment of your Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, I can recommend a Mind Healer with more experience in that field."

* * *

 

"I'm not talking to a Mind Healer." Draco's voice startled Harry from his thoughts. It was late at night, but neither of them was sleeping, because sleep brought dreams, and neither of them wanted to dream.

"Why not?" Harry asked, rolling over in his bed to face Draco's. "It could help."

"Because I'm not crazy. And I don't need anyone forcing me to delve up things better forgotten. How could that help? Making me remember it? Making me relive it? I'd do better without."

Harry didn't have an answer for him. For himself, he thought it was worth a try.

* * *

 

"Mr. Potter," Mind Healer Reis said, "Let's talk about the pregnancy today. How do you feel about it and so on?"

"I'm worried about Draco," Harry said. "He doesn't look well. He keeps making efforts to move passed what happened, but then the baby would bring him right back to it. The pregnancy is like a leech sucking the life right out of him."

"And what about you? How is the pregnancy affecting you?"

"I'm fine. Like I said, it's Draco I'm worried about."

* * *

 

Draco was starting to show.

Harry could see a little round bump under his shirt as he sat on the windowsill watching the Quidditch match going on outside.

He wanted to say that pregnancy looked good on Draco. That it made his hair shine and his skin glow. But that would be a lie.

Draco didn't look well.

He was sickly pale.

He was too thin.

His hair hung lank and lifeless.

He'd stopped taking pride and care in his looks like he'd done all through their childhood.

And he ate very little.

Madam Pomfrey force fed him nutrient potions every day because he never more than picked at his food.

That little baby bump was really the only weight on him.

He was whittling away.

He was barely recognizable.

Harry did not like the sight of him.

* * *

 

"Draco, aren't you sick of being in here all the time?" Harry asked late one night.

Draco didn't answer, but Harry knew he'd heard him.

"I'm sick of it. I want to get out. I hate being held in here like an invalid. I'm going stir crazy."

"You couldn't do it last time."

"I wasn't ready last time. Maybe I'm not ready this time, either, but I want to try. The thing is; I know I can't do it alone."

"What do you want, Potter?"

"Come with me. If we go together, I know we can make it. Please."

* * *

 

This time no one waited for him on the other side of the door. And Draco stood at his side instead of sitting behind him on the bed. He was still terrified, but he was sure he could do it this time.

He reached for Draco and grabbed on to his sleeve as if to hold himself up.

He took a deep breath and with eyes wide open, he stepped across the barrier.

* * *

 

Harry had been right. Having Draco with him did help transitioning back into normal life a little easier. The first couple of weeks had been tough and more than once he'd nearly broken down, but each time Draco had helped him through. Draco had had his own bad days, but Harry had been there to support him each time.

And things were going well.

They attended classes and ate meals in the Great Hall. They dealt with the scrutiny of their classmates without collapsing under the pressure of those gazes. They moved forward.

They even got to the point where they were comfortable being away from each other for long periods of time. Harry would sometimes go the the Gryffindor Common Room to be with Ron, Hermione, and Ginny. Draco had rekindled his friendship with Blaise Zabini and a few other Slytherins and spent time with them. They were getting better.

Draco was eating more. He was taking more pride in his appearance. He was filling out. He was looking healthy. Sometimes, he was even smiling.

* * *

 

At the end of the day, they still returned to the hospital wing and subjected themselves to Madam Pomfrey's care.

This was good, because the night was harder than the day.

During the day they had friends and classes and homework and other things to help them move forward.

At night, all they had was darkness, and dreams, and the ghost that lived inside their minds, and each other.

At night, Harry would lay awake, not wanting to sleep for fear of what he might encounter in his dreams.

At night, Draco would cry and scream and call out for Severus.

At night, they couldn't move forward.

* * *

"So, you've been back in classes for three months now," Healer Reis said. "We've already talked about how that transitioning felt, but I was wondering, has it gotten easier with time?"

"I guess so," Harry said. "I'm used to it now. I like being back in classes. I like being with my friends."

"Do you think you're ready to move back into the dormitory with your friends?"

"I don't think that would be a good idea. The only reason I was able to get back into the swing of things like taking classes and so on is because I had Draco with me. But we're in different dorms. I don't think it would be a good idea to separate us. Draco's not ready for it. He can't go it alone, yet. I'm not really ready for it either."

* * *

 

Draco was laughing at something Zabini had said to him and Harry couldn't help but smile. Laughing was something Draco did so rarely when he did it made the whole world seem lighter. Harry watched the two of them from his bed. Zabini had been visiting Draco a lot more recently and Harry felt grateful for that. He'd been doing his best, but there was no way he would have been able to help Draco heal all on his own, and now Zabini was doing his part.

Draco seemed lighter and happier and almost carefree. Sometimes, there was still that haunted look in his eyes and the monster that lived within him would steal away his words, but those times were becoming fewer and fewer.

Harry smiled.

Things were looking up.

* * *

 

Harry jumped from sleep to awake in a split second with the feeling that something was  _wrong_ hanging heavy in the air and gnawing at his heart. He looked over at the bed next to him and saw that it was empty.

Harry didn't even think about it. He hopped out of bed and ran for the bathroom. "Draco!" he yelled. "Draco! Open the door! Draco!" He pounded his fist against the door, yelling and kicking and pushing. "Draco! Draco please! Draco open the door!"

Madam Pomfrey ran over to Harry, having been summoned by his yelling. "Mr. Potter, what's going on?"

Harry ignored her and continued pounding on the door. Why wouldn't Draco answer him? Why wouldn't the door open? It needed to open. He need to get to Draco. He needed to. He kicked and punched the door, screamed out for Draco, begged with all his heart. Open. Open. Open!

The door swung open and Harry rushed inside. Draco was slumped against the wall in one corner of the small room with blood dripping from his wrists. It was everywhere. The blood. It was everywhere.

Someone screamed.

It might have been Harry. It might have been Madam Pomfrey.

Harry knelt down next to Draco not knowing what to do. Just knowing that Draco couldn't die. He wasn't allowed to. He wasn't allowed to leave Harry here alone. He couldn't leave him and Harry wasn't going to let him!

"Harry no!"

But Harry didn't hear. His magic roared up with one task in mind: saving Draco.

* * *

 

Harry felt dizzy and tired and weak.

He slumped over, exhausted and finally feeling that he was able to rest.

* * *

 

It was the pain that woke him.

Sharp twisting pains like knives in his belly. He could barely think straight from all of the pain. He opened his mouth and screamed.

Madam Pomfrey rushed over to his bedside and drew her wand, immediately casting spells and charms over him.

Harry screamed again.

Madam Pomfrey cursed.

"Mr. Potter, listed to me. Harry. Harry, listen to me. Harry, you're in labor right now, but your magic is too drained to help accommodate for you lack of female parts. We're going to have to perform a C-section. I need you to relax as much as you can. Do you understand me? Harry? Do you understand?"

No. He didn't understand. He didn't understand at all. What was she talking about? Harry was in labor? Impossible. Harry wasn't pregnant. He wasn't pregnant. Draco was. So how could he be in labor? What was going on?

Harry screamed again.

It hurt so much. There was so much pain. He couldn't deal with it. He couldn't handle it. He retreated. He went to a place where the pain couldn't reach him. Deep inside his mind.

Harry looked down at the poor boy on the bed. He was in pain. He was hurting so much. And there was so many people around. He wanted them to go away...but they weren't the ones hurting the poor boy. The boy's pain was coming from inside. These people was trying to help. But the boy was too lost in his pain to listen to them. Maybe Harry could help. Maybe Harry could calm the boy down.

He went to the boy and spoke softly to him. He tried to pass on to him comfort and reassurance. He tried to calm him. And it worked. The poor boy stopped screaming and fighting. He just lay on the bed and sobbed. The people in the room descended on him, but Harry was sure they were just trying to help. He backed up and let them work.

Someone else screamed.

Harry turned to see who.

It was the blond boy.

That poor little blond boy who had been there getting hurt by those bad men. He was in pain, too. Harry wanted to help him, but he was too tired. He was very tired. He tried to fight back the tiredness, but he couldn't. He couldn't even keep his eyes open. He wanted to rest.

* * *

 

Poppy Pomfrey stepped back and sighed.

To say the day had been rough would have been an understatement.

From Draco Malfoy's attempted suicide and Harry's magical exhaustion, she'd thought she'd seen the worst of it. But then Harry had gone into labor and become hysterical. And just when she and the healers from St. Mungo's had managed to calm and sedate him, Draco had gone into labor as well.

She'd really had a day of it.

But still, there was somethings that made bad days worth it. Like the miracle of life.

She looked down at the three sleeping infants, two boys and a girl, and smiled.

Harry had given birth to the two boys. Fraternal twins. One fathered by Draco Malfoy, the other by Tom Riddle. Draco had birthed the little princess, fathered by Tom Riddle.

The babies were barely this side of premature and were so tiny. She'd have to monitor them carefully, but she were sure they'd be alright. If they were anything like their fathers, then to say they were tough would be the least of it.

Poppy turned to the two boys that she'd started to think of as her sons in the time they'd been staying in her wing. The two of them had been through so much, and were still so young. They had a long and bumpy road ahead of them, but she was sure they would overcome.

**End Part 2.**

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Right, so the thing that I think some of you may not get. The scene where Harry goes into labor but says he's not pregnant: Harry coped with his pregnancy by blocking it out. He never associated the term with himself, he never accepted that he was pregnant. To him, his pregnancy didn't exist. It's an ego defense mechanism that I forgot the name of, but basically he rejected the idea so much that his brain decided that it didn't exist and even made him ignore the changes in his own body. So, Harry, obviously, was pregnant, but he didn't know he was pregnant and if you go back and read the chapter you'll see I deliberately avoided wording things in a way that would show Harry was aware of his pregnancy.


End file.
